As much as it’s The Penguin’s duty to report breaking news, even our staff gets tired of writing about parking at the new library.
To that end, we’ve compiled tidbits of information to bring you this Watercooler story:
Now open: The Greek Place
As blogger “SoCo Eats” mentions, the much-lauded Big Greek Cafe on Georgia Avenue is under new management and now operates as The Greek Place. It’s the same menu, SoCo Eats wrote, but is it the same plate-shattering, opa! taste? Who knows.
The Greek Place is the second downtown restaurant in the past six months to flip ownership soon after opening. South Silver Spring’s Pomegranate Cafe pulled a similar spin earlier this year.
Now covered: Addis Ababa
The fabled Ethiopian restaurant on Fenton Street is renovating its second-floor, open-air patio, according to Roylene Roberts, acting director for the Silver Spring Regional Center.
Say buh-bye to the sultry breeze blowing through your hair as you dip injera into a pile of doro wat, Roberts announced at Monday’s meeting of the citizens advisory board. Say hello to a new, fully enclosed second-floor dining room, complete with modern amenities like air conditioning.
It’s unknown when the conversion will be complete.
Coming soon: More pizza
Late last week, Penguin staff reported the pending arrival of a Flippin’ Pizza joint on Colesville Road. Now, the owners of Mrs K’s Toll House want in on the pizza action.
Management of the Woodside Park-based restaurant plans to do wood-fired pizza at the former Polonez Deli and Bakery site on Georgia Avenue near Sligo Avenue. More recent transplants (read: me) would know the place better as the vacant Georgia Blue shack next to the World Building.
According to the regional center’s Roberts, the pizza place will offer al fresco dining. She didn’t say when the restaurant will open.
Gone broke: The kiddie place
The Quality Time Early Learning Center on Georgia and Sligo Avenues has filed for bankruptcy, Roberts said. That doesn’t necessarily mean the two-story daycare center and its rubber-matted, fenced-in playground will be closing shop to the kiddies. But bankruptcy usually indicates bad financial straights for a business.
Roberts did not say whether the facility will end its operations.
In talks: The Fillmore
As reported in Wednesday’s Gazette, the county is still negotiating nebulous terms with the Lee Development Group for a Colesville Road lot that will become The Fillmore music hall. Last year, the development group agreed to donate the former JC Penney site to the county. In exchange, they got an extended lease on life for a larger, still unknown construction project on an adjacent lot.
Now, the negotiations seem to surround “[knowing] where their stuff is going to be and where our stuff is going to be,” Diane Schwartz-Jones, assistant chief administrative officer for MoCo exec Ike Leggett, told The Gazette. Whatever.
Expect a shovel to go into the ground sometime next year, The Gazette reported.
Photo courtesy of Flickr user wili_hybrid.
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OOOH so glad someone is moving into the blue shack and al fresco wood-fired pizza too – yummy!
@ Addis Ababa – booooooo. Way to eliminate the most unique and distinguishing part of your establishment. I understand that it makes the upstairs open more year round, but that outdoor patio was the character of that place.
Oh Frak! Eliminate an open air patio and replace it with air conditioning? Why not play an endless loop of Captain & Tenille songs while they’re at it? Talk about ruining a good thing.
All these new pizza places opening have me hopeful that we might actually get New York-quality pizza in our ‘hood. Next, bagels? Or does that hope risk offending the gods?
Just saw a new business at the corner of Colesville & Spring: “Kustom Clothing,” where the art gallery used to be. Can anyone explain, please, the benefit of misspelling “custom”?
I think we need a Penguin field trip to Addis Ababa before they seal the second floor. Any takers?
SR, that’s personalized, tailored spelling–presumably exemplifying the custom touch of Kustom Clothing.
Is there a pizza god we can pray to that at least ONE of those places will be good?
I would totally go for Ethiopian with a bunch of Penguin groupies in the meantime, though.
Chaz, got it, but “Custom Clothing” conveys all that, too.
It’s krazy..
We already have Manny&Olga! Hope this Flippin place has a good selection of beers…any word on if they’ll serve?
Hey – I heard a CVS was moving into the kiddie place. Anyone know if that’s still the plan?
Two co-workers went to the newly-owned The Greek Place for lunch, and praised it to the rafters. I have yet to sample the grub from the new management myself.
I think they meant “Custom Klothing.”
Mrs. K’s isn’t in Woodside Park. It is in Seven Oaks-Evanswood, diagnonally across Colesville Road and Dale Drive from Woodside Park.
What the heck kind of a name for a neighborhood is Seven Oaks-Evanswood, anyway? I keep getting newsletters from the community association but I refuse to join it until they come up with a less made-up sounding name.
This whole Greek cafe thing is very odd because I went there this past weekend, after they had reopened, and the guy behind the counter greeted me as someone who’d been there before. So maybe the owners are different but the owners are not the same as the people who actually work there, who are the same?
I don’t understand why someone would buy a restaurant and then flip it. Can you make money that way?! Why would you go to all the trouble of opening a business, then sell immediately? Scratching head…
So maybe our visit to Addis Ababa 2 years ago was on one of their “off” days but man, I gotta say they turned me way off of Ethiopian food. We had a huge sample platter and can honestly say we didn’t enjoy the taste of anything on it. The main descriptive word used that night was “bland”. Perhaps we had the wrong expectations? Figured food would be full of flavor with intriguing spices? Any suggestions on what we should order if we ever venture out there again? It’s so close to home (4 blocks) we’d love to see it as an enjoyable place like some of you do.
L.P.
Actually, Mrs. Kay’s is in “South Woodside Park”. I live a block from there and that’s what it says on my plat and every legal document associated with my home. I always though Seven Oaks was the neighborhood just on the north side of Sligo Creek Park, just east of Colesville. I guess I’ll have to change my screen name now to Southwoodsideparker.
I considered “RoundthecornerfromWholeFoodser” but decided I’ll wait till we find out what goofy thing they name the new civic building and see if that’s better.
HEY FRIENDS–
MY NAME IS SIMOS AND I’M THE CREATOR OF THE BIG GREEK CAFE. WE HAD A PATNERSHIP WITH THE OWNERS OF THAT LOCATION. DUE TO DIFFERENCES AND MISUNDERSTANDINGS, WE DECIDED TO WALK. I DO HAVE GOOD NEWS THOUGH, THE BIG GREEK CAFE WILL BE OPENING IN SILVER SPRING AGAIN– BIGGER AND BETTER. JOIN US ON FACEBOOK AT THE BIG GREEK CAFE TO RECIEVE UPDATES ON THE NEW LOCATION. AGAIN THANKS
Editor’s note: This person’s identity cannot be verified. The same person left this comment under the same screen name on The Penguin’s review of the Big Greek Cafe. — JD (May 14, 2009)
Well, according to this map, Mrs. K’s is in Seven Oaks. Don’t be trying to take it for your neighborhood – it’s ours!
So what’s the final verdict: Woodside Park or Seven Oaks?
Well, that map referenced by Sligo was produced by the Seven Oaks-Evenswood Citiznes Association so of course it would include Mrs. K’s.
I still say it’s in South Woodside Park.
Look at this map,
and this one, too.
Would appreciate reporting on the Quality Time Early Learning Cter situation. I have seen 2 businesses that I loved replaced with CVSs. CVS does sell useful stuff. But it already has quite a few locations.
Could the QTELC have been coping with a rent increase, for example? From what I have seen, the place has been very popular with parents. It must be hard to do this as a business, however. Doesn’t child care get federal subsidies in European countries?
Woodsider – stop trying to annex parts of my neighborhood. You are going to start a Silver Spring Civil War.
If these maps you link to are correct, then the “Evanswood” portion of the Seven Oaks-Evanswood neighborhood doesn’t exist. Here is your neighborhood. Stay within these borders and there won’t be any trouble.
As a member of SOECA, I resent those hoity-toities from Woodside Park trying to muscle into our turf. That goes double for those jerks from Shelbyville!
Listing something as “South Woodside Park” sounds about as insane as Rockville people trying to designate part of Rockville as “North Bethesda” (or “NoBe”) for development purposes.
Hey don’t shoot the messenger–I was just relaying what all the legal docs on my house say the neighborhood has been called. I did go on the SOECA yahool listerv the other day and asked the specific question: where does Evanswood come from? No response yet.
Thayer: the habit of real estate developers incorporating the name of an adjacent (or nearby)community has been going on for a few hundred years and not just in this country. There are countless examples in London, Paris, Barcelona. Lil’ Ole South Woodside Park is just a blip.
Screw all you Silver Spring lowlifes – I live in “East Chevy Chase”.
Maybe Jen will hold a contest for the most creative and innacurate nicknames/acronyms for our neighborhoods.
For example, NoWho could be used for two locations: either the area immediately north of Whole Foods, OR the area immediately surrounding the Days Inn.
Sorry, I hope I don’t get edited for content!